e of the two or three
defiant verities of the best religious morality, of real Christianity,
for example, is exactly this same thing; the chief assertion of
religious morality is that white is a colour. Virtue is not the absence
of vices or the avoidance of moral dangers; virtue is a vivid and
separate thing, like pain or a particular smell. Mercy does not mean
not being cruel or sparing people revenge or punishment; it means a
plain and positive thing like the sun, which one has either seen or
not seen.

Chastity does not mean abstention from sexual wrong; it means
something flaming, like Joan of Arc. In a word, God paints in
many colours; but He never paints so gorgeously, I had almost
said so gaudily, as when He paints in white. In a sense our age
has realised this fact, and expressed it in our sullen costume.
For if it were really true that white was a blank and colourless
thing, negative and non-committal, then white would be used instead
of black and grey for the funeral dress of this pessimistic per